City Hall Wedding? Mayor's Spokeswoman to Tie the Knot

Brooks and Kohns, along with Coco, at the Palisades Parade in 2007. (Photo by Lateef Mangum.)

Stop the presses. The mayor's spokeswoman is making news.

As if Carrie Brooks weren't busy enough as Mayor Adrian M. Fenty's communications director in a busy summer--youth jobs program meltdown, more problems at the Child and Family Service Agency, Fenty's biking accident--she's got an even bigger job on her plate: Her upcoming marriage to Daniel Kohns, a government relations and communications strategist for Public Strategies Inc. Brooks tells D.C. Wire that the couple recently decided to get hitched in November, with a simple ceremony, probably at the courthouse, then celebrate with a honeymoon to an exotic locale.

The Wire asked Brooks whether the mayor might preside as the officiant, but she reported that Hizzoner lacks the authority to do so; at least that's what the mayor's office was told when it inquired after two other couples asked for Fenty to conduct their ceremonies.

"You have to be a judge or ordained," Brooks said, noting that Fenty could seek to obtain a marriage license on-line and then would be able to conduct the ceremony.

That's news to Lydia Sermons, who served as spokeswoman for former Mayor Anthony A. Williams (D). When Sermons married then-WTOP reporter Derrick Ward in 2001, Williams co-presided along with deputy mayor Carolyn Graham, who is a minister. Sermons said that she wanted Graham there because she is very religious, but that Williams would have been fine to do it solo as a civil ceremony, had she opted for that.

Williams wore one of his trademark bow-ties, Sermons said, adding that the mayor "gave the final 'You-may-kiss-the-bride.'"

"He did quite well," she recalled. "He was kind of like a father figure, since I was on his staff."